China has already rejected the EU’s carbon blackmail, and now the Indian government has done the same. Not only is the EU in danger of starting a global trade war, but repercussions are widening, as China cancels a $14bn order with European aircraft manufacturer Airbus.

And all for what? To prop up the EU’s pointless emissions trading scheme which will do virtually nothing for the climate, and everything to damage Europe’s competitiveness. Even Reuters, in the article below, acknowledges that the carbon price in the EU is too low to encourage any low-carbon investment. What a joke.

NEW DELHI, March 22 (Reuters) – India joined China in asking its airlines to boycott the European Union’s carbon scheme on Thursday, confirming what a senior Indian government source previously told Reuters and stoking a diplomatic row over the issue.

“Though the European Union has directed Indian carriers to submit emissions details of their aircraft by March 31, 2012, no Indian carrier is submitting them in view of the position of the government,” India’s civil aviation minister Ajit Singh said on Thursday.

“Hence the imposition of a carbon tax does not arise,” Singh told lawmakers in a written reply.

The European Commission was not immediately available to comment. [LOL – Ed]

India’s opposition to the Emission Trading Scheme (ETS), a major plank in the bloc’s efforts to curb carbon dioxide emissions and combat global warming, could damage the chances of the Free Trade Agreement (FTA) it is negotiating with the EU.

On Monday, a senior government official told Reuters that India would ask local airlines not to buy carbon credits from or share emissions data with the bloc.

Since January this year, all airlines using EU airports start to become liable to pay for carbon emissions, but no carriers will be handed a bill until next year.

Initially, they will also be given free allowances to cover the bulk of the cost.

The March 31 deadline is one of a series for airlines to comply with various EU requirements. Documents seen by Reuters showed that airlines, including from India and China, have previously signed up to become eligible for free allowances.

SOVEREIGNTY

Foreign governments, including the world’s top three carbon emitters – the United States, China and India – say the EU is exceeding its legal jurisdiction by charging for an entire flight, as opposed to just the part covering European airspace.

In a meeting last month in Moscow of the so-called “coalition of the unwilling”, countries opposed to the EU law including India, agreed on retaliatory steps, although it did not agree on enforcing them.

China said in February its airlines were barred from participating in the EU Emissions Trading Scheme unless they gained government approval. Beijing has also suspended the purchase of $14 billion worth of jets from European maker Airbus .

The EU’s Climate Commissioner Connie Hedegaard has said the EU only adopted its current policy because efforts to agree a United Nations scheme to curb rising aviation emissions had failed.

She has repeatedly said the EU will stand by its law unless the United Nations’ International Civil Aviation Organization can come up with a global plan.

The European Parliament has also reiterated support for the carbon charge and officials say it could decide to express its anger at India by blocking the Free Trade Agreement with the country. (source)

The EU is embarking on a very dangerous journey. It will end in tears for the EU, and China and India will be laughing.

India abandons the IPCC ship, which is listing heavily to starboard, taking on water, and heading for the bottom of the ocean. Rather than base climate policy on the discredited pronouncements of the IPCC, India has wisely decided to set up its own climate research bodies. Hello, hello, testing, testing – anyone listening to this in Canberra?? Nope. Eyes and ears firmly closed.

India has established its own body to monitor the effects of global warming because it “cannot rely” on the United Nations’ Intergovernmental Panel on Climate Change, the group headed by its own Nobel Prize-winning scientist Dr R K Pachauri.

The Indian government’s move is a significant snub to both the IPCC and Dr Pachauri as he battles to defend his reputation following the revelation his most recent climate change report included false claims that most of the Himalayan glaciers would melt away by 2035. Scientists believe it could take more than 300 years for the glaciers to disappear.

The body and its chairman have faced growing criticism ever since as questions have been raised on the credibility of their work and the rigour with which climate change claims are assessed.

In India the false claims have heightened tensions between Dr Pachauri and the government, which had earlier questioned his glacial melting claims. In Autumn, its environment minister Mr Jairam Ramesh said while glacial melting in the Himalayas was a real concern, there was evidence that some were actually advancing in the face of global warming.

Dr Pachauri had dismissed challenges like these as based on “voodoo science”, but last night Mr Ramesh effectively marginalised the IPC chairman even further.

He announced the Indian government will established a separate National Institute of Himalayan Glaciology to monitor the effects of climate change on the world’s ‘third ice cap’, and an ‘Indian IPCC’ to use ‘climate science’ to assess the impact of global warming throughout the country.

“There is a fine line between climate science and climate evangelism. [Yes, and the IPCC crossed it years ago – Ed] I am for climate science. I think people misused [the] IPCC report, [the] IPCC doesn’t do the original research which is one of the weaknesses … they just take published literature and then they derive assessments, so we had goof-ups on Amazon forest, glaciers, snow peaks.

Like this:

Probably because they’re both more interested in raising millions of their own populations out of a miserable life of poverty rather than flushing trillions of dollars down the toilet on pointless efforts to “tackle climate change”, which, as any fule kno, will change nothing about the climate.

India has confirmed it worked with China and other emerging nations to ensure there were no legally binding targets from the Copenhagen climate talks.

Facing parliament for the first time since the UN talks last weekend in the Danish capital, Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh said India had “come out quite well in Copenhagen”.

He listed what he said were a series of accomplishments, including the thwarting of moves to impose binding targets for global reductions in carbon emissions – something India has always rejected.

“We can be satisfied that we were able to get our way on this issue,” declared Mr Ramesh, who has consistently said India would be one of the countries hardest hit by climate change.

Like this:

But, but, but… India and China are on board, surely? Surely Obama just went over there and charmed the pants off them all and everything in the garden was rosy, but now what’s happened? I really wish we’d voted Turnbull back in, because then Australia would turn up to Copenhagen with a shiny new ETS, and it would make all the difference!

Top Indian officials dismissed a draft climate change proposal by Denmark that expects developing economies to peak their greenhouse gas emissions by 2025, news reports said Monday.

The draft document was circulated to a few countries ahead of the Dec. 7-18 UN climate conference in Copenhagen, which is supposed to draw up an agreement for controlling emissions of carbon dioxide and other gases [which probably aren’t]causing global warming.

Environment Minister Jairam Ramesh said the Danish draft was “totally unacceptable,” The Economic Times reported.

“We are never going to take on a peaking year for absolute emissions. This is not on the horizon,” Ramesh told the Danes, according to the newspaper.

So China’s cut of 40% isn’t a cut at all (it’s an increase), India isn’t interested either, the US isn’t going to pass any legislation anytime soon (if at all). Copenhagen is shaping up to be a complete non-event.